Just read an article from Pa fish and game. They believe the bass in there now is only adults no juveniles. The disease for smallies is running rampant with lesions and everything else. Will have to find the article or least copy and paste it

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“If, when you pull a fly out youdon’t hear drums and can’t smellchicken blood in the air, put it backin the box, for if it is evil you seek,then it can only be conjured with thesame.”

John Arway fears the smallmouth bass could be the Susquehanna's Andrea Gail.

"Is a perfect storm coming? We think it may be," says the executive director of the Pennsylvania Fish & Boat Commission.

The juvenile bass population has essentially crashed.

All that are left are the adults.

"The bass we have left are the ones we have to rely upon to repopulate the river," said Arway.

It takes five or six years for a bass to grow to 15 inches.

And now the adults are getting sick as well: gross lesions; papillomas; bacterial infections that normally wouldn't affect healthy fish; and male fish with female characteristics.

The particular causes of each disease aren't yet known, but the multiple pressures stressing the fish certainly are: low dissolved oxygen levels in the water, high dissolved phosphorus; industrial, agricultural and household contaminants that ultimately wend their way into the river.

"I don't want to be the director when the last bass is caught in the river," says Arway.

And so, for most of the year, he has been waging a campaign to convince the Department of Environmental Protection to declare the middle section of the Susquehanna an impaired waterway.

And thus far, the DEP is not convinced.

In fact, the testy back-and-forth between DEP Secretary Michael Krancer and Arway has at times had the whiff of dueling skunks.

Arway says Krancer's people aren't looking at the science the right way.

Krancer's people say Arway is making assumptions and extrapolations that aren't supported by the data.

Arway says the preponderance of evidence is quite literally as clear as the lesions on the fish.

The argument has been going on all year.

It took on a different character Tuesday afternoon as Arway teamed up with the National Wildlife Federation, which has hired former PennFuture executive director Jan Jarrett to help, and the two convened a meeting of more than 30 people representing anglers, fishing clubs, guide services, rod and reel stores, outfitters, river keepers, conservationists, scientists and state agencies with jurisdiction over the river.

The goal, Jarrett said, is to create "an organized and persistent voice" to save the river.

It's something the Susquehanna has never had, she said.

The voices around the table were anything but organized at Tuesday's meeting.

But they were persistent, in part because two representatives from DEP were also there.

Rod Kime and Kelly Heffner were peppered with outrage from anglers and outfitters who have seen fish populations plummet.

The regulators kept their game faces on, but offered little to mollify the rest of the table.

To DEP's credit, Kime outlined a program of fairly extensive testing the agency launched this year and said, "We will be doing an equivalent amount of work or more this summer."

Heffner told the group, "We absolutely believe there's something wrong with the fish. We get that. We understand it. But what we are unable to do is say it's this thing that's causing it."

Arway's retort is that DEP has not required specific causation before listing other rivers as impaired.

Kime said such a listing is no quick fix.

"I've been doing these listings since 1998, and no money has ever come with it," he said.

What almost always does come with it, he said, is delay and a legal challenge.

And there's the rub, because - as Kime noted - it's DEP that must defend the listing.

Arway reiterated his request to see the data and analysis upon which DEP's decision not to list the river is based.

He said Krancer promised to share it with him six months ago, and he hasn't seen "a shred" of data from DEP since.

He didn't see any on Tuesday either, and the messages from Kime and Heffner on whether he ever would were mixed.

They walked out of the meeting early; she had to go to another meeting, he said.

"There's obviously a bit of tension between the agencies," said one of the people at the table when they were gone.

The conference room walls resounded will laughter.

The ensuing discussion did not result in an organized voice, but there was general agreement to be persistent and to meet again.

In the river, where the remaining bass still swim, nothing had changed.

Posted on: 2012/12/11 23:27

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There is no disadvantage in being able to cast far"- Lefty Kreh -

It seams the disease is affecting the Delaware river also, not to mention the f*#@ing cormorants eating all summer. The hatchery at the Salmon River has a video that highlights the issues with these birds up there. We used to only see them around Trenton during the herring run but now they are here all summer eating any fish 8" or less, smallies, herring, shad, "eyes", stripers etc. Some states have started killing eggs and adults to reduce thier population. But at any rate the smallie populaton in the area of bucks county is been rapidly decreasing over the last 5 years.

Love2fish, You are right about the smallie decline on the Delaware but I don't think it's the same issue as the Susquehanna. Interestingly the trout and striper population seems to be higher the past few years.

daman1277 wrote:They believe the bass in there now is only adults no juveniles.

This is nonsense.Bass populations are well below historical averages in the lower Susky. Everyone who fishes the river knows this and the reason for the bass decline in that section of river has not been identified. Yes, there are lesions but they are found all through the West and North Branch where bass populations remain strong. Yes, there are lots of predatory birds - but they are up everywhere. Yes, there are pollutants from endocrine effluent and intersex characteristics......but these too are common across all the big mid Atlantic Rivers. Something is wrong with the bass in the lower Susky. At this point, the causes are speculation. More study is needed.With respect to juveniles: they are still there, just in depressed numbers in the lower Susky. It is hyperbole and irresponsible to assert that there are no YOY bass. This issue is studied/surveyed every year. Check out the numbers:Lower Susky YOY

Bass populations are well below historical averages in the lower Susky. Everyone who fishes the river knows this and the reason for the bass decline in that section of river has not been identified. Yes, there are lesions but they are found all through the West and North Branch where bass populations remain strong. Yes, there are lots of predatory birds - but they are up everywhere. Yes, there are pollutants from endocrine effluent and intersex characteristics......but these too are common across all the big mid Atlantic Rivers. Something is wrong with the bass in the lower Susky. At this point, the causes are speculation. More study is needed.

So basically no one knows what is going on with the population on the Susky? Is this affecting small mouth as well?

Personally I have had a blast learning the art of trout fishing, tho very frustrating at times, but have had nice success with WW species. Look forward to hitting the Susky next summer as well as some other WW rivers and creeks in my radius.

Posted on: 2012/12/12 10:06

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There are no evil thoughts except one, the refusal to think

jrmyln wrote:Love2fish, You are right about the smallie decline on the Delaware but I don't think it's the same issue as the Susquehanna. Interestingly the trout and striper population seems to be higher the past few years.

After several emails with ppl that are very active with Delaware River conservation they did confirm disease that is affecting populations not sure if that the only factor or a contributing factor but very concerning. I have also seen where those f*#%ing birds a an invasive species but we are not allowed to kill them. It just worries me and a group of friends that basically live in the river.

I spoke about the late, great Susquehanna several times. And I know, FishIdiot, that a few 8"ers can be caught? BFD!

I was some of the few who used to catch >100 beautiful healthy jumping smallmouth with a flyrod....... Bob Clouser was another!

Then, about ten years ago, we would catch dozens of small channel cats with a fly rod around Wrightsville.

The last couple years, even the channel cats and even carp have legions on almost every fish!

We used to have "world class" smallmouth, but now it's only a memory.

Shooting all the cormorants is a good thing (all the hunters should kill them for target practice) but the Susky around Perdix used to be clean water with a gravel bottom......... now it has a mud bottom and it actually smells!

It breaks my heart, and the "no kill" didn't really help at all!

The white flies still hatch, but almost no fish rising for them anymore!

Here 's my 2 cents. Ever walk down the aisles of Home Depot and Lowes and see how much Lawn poison is sold to every person that owns a lawn in this country ? Roundup, etc., every poison for every need, go figure. Where does all this go ? I think we start a grass roots campaign to outlaw all of these poisons.